This is how many points your team needs to qualify for the Champions League knockout stages

This week's fixtures brought the curtain down on the Champions League for 2025, giving us a chance to pause for breath.

When the competition returns on Tuesday, January 20, there will be just two rounds of matches remaining in the league phase.

Across the final two weeks of January, teams will be fighting for a place in the top eight of the table - which guarantees qualification for the last 16 - or a spot in the play-offs, contested by the clubs finishing ninth to 24th.

Working out the number of points needed to reach the Champions League knockout stages

The Premier League's six representatives - Arsenal, Manchester City, Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur, Newcastle United and Chelsea - could all still finish in the top eight.

Mikel Arteta's Gunners lead the table and are the only team with a 100 per cent record, while fourth-place City are the other English side in the automatic qualification places, sitting five points further back on 13.

Then, there is a collection of Premier League teams between ninth and 13th: Liverpool, on 12 points, followed by Spurs with 11, and Newcastle and Chelsea, who both have 10.

When this format - also called the 'Swiss model' - was introduced last season, Opta ran 50,000 simulations of the league phase through its supercomputer to work out how many points would be needed to qualify.

In 98 per cent of simulations, 16 points was enough for a top-eight place - and that's exactly what happened in reality. Aston Villa squeezed into eighth with 16, pipping ninth-placed Atalanta by a single point.

Meanwhile, Opta predicted that 10 points would be enough to finish in the top 24, whereas it actually proved to be 11, with Dinamo Zagreb also achieving that tally but missing out on goal difference.

With two rounds of this season's league phase remaining, Atletico Madrid are eighth with 12 points, above Liverpool on goals scored, while 24th-place FC Copenhagen have seven points.

Arsenal are all-but guaranteed a place in the last 16, but City are likely to need at least three points from their final two fixtures, away to Bodo/Glimt and at home to Galatasaray.

Liverpool visit Marseille and then host Qarabag, and will hope for a return of at least four points to gatecrash the top eight, while Tottenham's home game against 10th-place Borussia Dortmund looks pivotal, especially with a trip to Eintracht Frankfurt on the final day.

Spurs, like Newcastle and Chelsea, should already be guaranteed a place in the knockout round play-offs, but all three clubs will probably need to win both games next month to sneak into the top eight and avoid adding a two-legged play-off to their congested calendars.

The Magpies host PSV Eindhoven before visiting holders Paris Saint-Germain, while Chelsea entertain Pafos and finish with a trip to Napoli.